The present invention relates to devices for the holding of textiles articles and, in particular, to textile articles of very thin thickness. The invention is especially useful for the temporary holding of hosiery articles especially panty hose and stockings just prior to their automatic transfer to a new location.
The presently known devices for holding textile or similar materials are incapable, above all, of overcoming the difficulties related to the automatic picking up of pieces made of very light and thin fabric, one at a time, from a stack. In fact, the pneumatic and mechanical systems so far known do not solve this problem in a reliable repeatable way for the following reasons among others: the pneumatic devices fail with airpermeable fabrics as the air passing through them may suck more than one piece at a time, the mechanisms which utilize pins may pierce through the article and thus may likewise hold more than one article at a time. In particular, such devices are not suited for thin, light and flexible fabics as for stockings and panty-hoses.
A similar difficulty encountered with the known devices consists in opening, that is spreading apart a flattened tubular fabric, a basic operation in the treatment of stockings and pantyhoses which poses a problem, when using these devices, equivalent to the one present when picking up a single piece of fabric at a time from a stack.
It is known from the Italian Patent No. 9438-A/86, a device for holding fabrics by means of an adhesive comprising a support structure for a holding element, in the form of a tape, being motorized for advancing discontinuously between two transmission and tension members so that, upon every interruption of said movement, at least the outer surface of the holding element between the two transmission and tension members is provided with suitable adhesive material. Such device, although suitable for individually picking up the articles made of even thin fabric from a stack of like articles, does not allow, if the fabric is for hosiery and the article is tubular like, in particular panty-hoses and stockings, the elastic edge to be instantly stretched out, in view of their automatic transfer, a basic operation in the finish treatment of stockings and panty-hoses.
In fact, even the light pressure of the adhesive tape onto the upper face of the tubular article, which upon its holding is in flat condition, also causes the holding of those burrs of fabric of the lower face of the article that result retained by the stitches of the upper face. This fact, when the holding device and the stack of articles move away, causes the spontaneous stretching out of gravity of the elastic edge of the panty-hose or stocking with such a delay as to result unacceptable in relation to the times of automatic transfer required in the treatment of these products.